EVENT-DRIVEN IMAGE AND VEHICLE STATUS MANAGEMENT FOR LOW-POWER IOT DIGITAL LICENSE PLATES

Abstract

Modern vehicles are increasingly adopting IoT-enabled technologies, and digital license plates provide a transformative platform for vehicle management, security, and automated operations. Smart digital license plates can dynamically update display images, detect stolen vehicles, interact with toll systems, and communicate with garage systems to automatically open or close gates as vehicles enter or exit. A key challenge in these low-power IoT devices is managing frequent image updates while minimizing energy consumption, since they operate on embedded batteries. This paper presents a secure, event-driven image and vehicle status management system for digital license plates that supports both permanent and temporary images, including dealership-specific branding during the vehicle lifecycle. All image updates are authenticated and verified through a central server maintained by the Department of Motor Vehicles to ensure compliance and security. For stolen vehicle detection, customers can report theft via a mobile application, triggering the central server to push a vehicle status update to the digital license plate. Upon receiving the update, the plate displays the stolen status image and leverages an embedded GPS module to transmit real-time location coordinates to the central server, enabling law enforcement and customer monitoring. To reduce network usage and power consumption, the system employs event-triggered updates rather than continuous polling, ensuring efficient communication without compromising security or responsiveness. The solution integrates low-power display management, cryptographic verification, event-driven updates, and GPS tracking, providing a comprehensive framework for secure and intelligent vehicle identification systems.